Streisand / LIVE 

Dec. 24, 1971—Jan. 14, 1972 Shows

Program/Credits

Robert Klein ( opening comedy act )

Joe Guercio ( Conductor )

Tommy Check ( Drums )

Ray Neapolitan ( Bass )

Bo Ayars ( Keys )

Eddie Kendricks Singers

One year later, Barbra returned to the Hilton (formerly The International). This time, Joe Guercio served as Streisand's musical director. 

Guercio was appointed the musical director of the hotel in April 1970, his chief function “to supervise all musical endeavors in the new $60 million resort complex. His areas of supervision will include the hotel’s 2,000-seat main showroom.”

Guercio was well-known as Elvis Presley’s music director. In 2010, compared the two singers: “They were perfectionists in different ways. One was from the North, one from the South. He liked peanut butter and banana sandwiches. She liked a piece of herring and a bagel. She liked Johnny Mercer stuff. He liked Hound Dog. But they both wanted it perfect.”

Bo Ayars (who at various points of his career worked as a music director, conductor, arranger, and pianist) played keys for Streisand at the Hilton. He also helped develop Barbra’s opening medley. “She had Joe [Guercio] and I come see her in Los Angeles,” he explained. “We go to her house in Beverly Hills, she’s very relaxed. We combined two songs, ‘Sing,’ which her son Jason loved from Sesame Street. So we put it together with another song that was popular at the time called ‘Make Your Own Kind of Music.’ Joe, my mentor, always said that if two songs go together lyrically you can make them go together musically. That was her opening number.”

For the 1971-72 Hilton shows, comedian Robert Klein (Barbra's costar in The Owl and the Pussycat ) was her opening act. He performed a 30-minute comedy routine before Barbra took the stage.

“She enters quietly and unannounced in a dark two-piece pants suit with a different colored blouse … starts to sing and – suddenly – there is that wonderful rare occurrence when the magic of the true superstar mesmerizes an entire audience, individually and collectively,” wrote Joe Delaney for the Las Vegas Sun .

For the Christmas Eve show, Streisand sang “Silent Night” as her encore for the audience.

For many of the Hilton shows, Barbra wore stretch satin pantsuits, with her hair up in a bun. The tea table that has become synonymous with a Streisand concert was also present on the Hilton stage. As most reviewers agreed, the highlight of the Hilton concerts was the duet “One Less Bell To Answer/A House is Not a Home.” It was staged dramatically, with Barbra singing the duet with herself, which was a pre-recorded track. 

Three months after Streisand’s last show at the Hilton, her set was flown to the Forum in Los Angeles where she sang at a big fundraiser for presidential candidate George McGovern. This concert was taped by Columbia Records and released as Live Concert at the Forum. On it, you can hear Barbra’s 1972 act, minus the duet of “One Less Bell,” which she did not perform that evening, and minus a few other songs.